Nevertheless...
Posted by Timothy Wheeler on May 22, 1999 at 10:40:09:In Reply to: "True Colors" posted by Myla Reson on May 20, 1999 at 15:40:25:
Myla,
Nevertheless, you did not retract your earlier statement linking the "solution" of radioactive waste management to the termination of our nation's nuclear weapons program! And I believe that such a statement speaks volumns about the true motivation of anti-nuclear organizatons in their opposition to radioactive waste management. The CCNS web page is loaded with statements that pretty well say as much right up front.
The leadership of such organizations as the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the CCNS, CARD, and the Southwest Research and Information Center all have an agenda with regard to any aspect of nuclear relate activities, be they related to weapons, nuclear power, or medical research and treatment. But their agenda is political, not technical, and the waste end of the nuclear cycle has become th keystone to their anti-nuclear strategy.The leadership of these organizations and their legal advisors have, in the past, tried and failed to convince our society to cease the development of nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, and nuclear pharmacy. Having, to a large degree, failed to stop such endeavors directly, anti-nuclear organizations have adopted a "war of attrition" approach in which they attempt to out flank nuclear related activities using any legal and beauracratic means possible. Part of this strategy is to use nuclear waste management as one of the primary planks of their anti-nuclear platform.
If one accepts that there are no workable solutions to the radioactive waste issue, then that gives a measure of logic to the opposition of any activities which generate such waste. No matter how "safe" or "necessary" the actual activity might be, if it has an unworkable waste issue then one has a legitimate argument for questioning that activity. The leadership of the anti-nuclear organizations is not stupid, and they understand this perfectly well. If they fail to attack the waste end of the nuclear cycle then they lose a lot of political leaverage in their opposition to nuclear related activities.
But lets suppose that we all wake up next week, grab our morning paper, and read that the U.S. will unilaterally disarm its entire nuclear arsenal, shut down all nuclear power plants, and cease the importation of medical radioisotopes from Canada, effective immediately. What then? What about all of the radioactive waste that currently exists at ground level, sitting in drums, tanks, and buildings that definitely do NOT date from the Permian period. Do you really believe that all of these environmental and anti-nuclear organizations would continue to fundamentally oppose the deposition of the waste in deep geologic repositories? Of course they wouldn't. It would be counter their own core values not to push towards getting the waste out of its current locations and into a much safer configuration.
Anti-nuclear organizations will continue to dredge up technical "concerns" until the very same waste repositories, which they currently oppose, someday fit in with their environmental and political agenda.
I have actually sat in DOE hearings on the shipment of weapons grade spent nuclear fuel from Europe to the U.S. wherein a national environmental organization (the NRDC) spoke out in favor of such action. Why? Because the NRDC felt that such transportation was safe and the world would be safer with such fuel in U.S. custody. Imagine that - the NRDC felt that the transportation of highly radioactive, highly enriched uranium fuel, through densely populated ports on the American coast was safe! Yet the CCNS and CARD worry (allegedly) about the safety of transuranic wastes packaged in incredibly strong containers. Why? Because in one case science has “solved” all of the problems and in the other science has "failed" to do so? No, its because the shipment of weapons grade uranium out of Europe fit the political agenda of the NRDC and the shipment of transuranic waste to WIPP does not fit the political agenda of CARD and the CCNS.
Tim Wheeler